September Thoughts

It's turning out to be a quite a pleasant Labor Day weekend on the Giants side of town. I came home from a neighborhood BBQ just in time to see the late-inning home run conga line at Chavez Ravine on Saturday night - followed by, naturally, Eric Collins and Steve Lyons picking up the pieces of their shattered evening during the post game analysis.

Then on Sunday, Jonathan Sanchez found his bag of awesome and brought all of it to the mound. Fortunately it was a bigger bag than Hiroki Kuroda's. The Bums couldn't get the leadoff batter on in any inning, and the ones who did get on got stranded there. I don't know how much stock to put in Mike Krukow's theory that he's a different pitcher now that he has confidence in his splitter. I'm wary to get too excited because a theory like that gets me really excited. Lincecum became a better pitcher after he found his changeup. What I do know is that the Dodgers couldn't really make anything happen against him, and that's three sold starts in his last four for Sanchez.

So big props not just to Sanchez, but to all of the G-Men for bouncing back with their backs against the wall in game two, then coming back strong in game three to take this series. And by the way, we're finally taking advantage of the skidding Padres and their camouflage uniforms (which I can totally see).

Which brings me of course, to my complaint: Torres and Huff. Not an angry complaint, as I'm happy to currently be within one game of the division, but what's wrong with them lately?

Torres - 1 for his last 20. Is it because he's no longer under the radar? From the man himself: "I see a lot of breaking balls and changeups." From me: "Okay, well, hit them."

Huff - 4 for his last 36. He's apparently wearing a red thong until he gets out of the slump. Whatever works, Aubrey.

I'm not too worried because other Giants are stepping up: Panda continues to make up for his abysmal first half, Posey is Posey, Uribe is clutch, and the starters are starting to remember exactly who brings home the bacon around here anyway. But I want Huff and Torres at the party, too. If yesterday they had played like the version of their selves I saw for most of this year, Posey and Sandoval's good games would have changed from solid individual efforts into a sustained rallies, thus, more runs. I'll take wins any way they come, and I'm pleased to finally have a team that has enough good players so that they can still win while one or two guys are slumping. But Torres and Huff have been the team MVP's for most of the season and this is a bad time to slump. When is it a good time to slump? Never. But in September, it's harder to climb out.

Go Giants.